The Prince Hamlet - Essay Example

It has been said of Hamlet that something in his genius renders him superior to decision and incapable of acting. His enormous intellectual activity prevents instant action and the result is a delay in irresolution. We know him as one from the way he behaves, not from the things he says he believes. We may not assume, indeed, that he believes what he says. For one thing, he is a soul in agitation, his equilibrium has been lost. This glass of fashion and this mod of form, this noble mind whose harmony was once like that of sweet bells rung in tune, his courtier, soldier, scholar whose disposition has hitherto been generous and free from all contriving, this matchless gentleman who has never been known to overstep the modesty of nature, is not himself save for a few minutes in the end when his calmness comes back like magic. His words elsewhere are wild and whirling, or they are cruel in their kindness, or they are simply cruel. Or they are spoken for a calculated effect. Hamlet is being immensely sensitive to his environment and adjusts himself with marvelous quickness to its many changes. His asides are sudden. His repartee is pistol-swift and his soliloquies are secret mirrors (Van Doren 187-199).

One critical perspective treats the prince as a tragic hero having three prominent characteristics: a willpower that surpasses average human beings, an extraordinarily intense power of feeling, and an unusually high level of intelligence. Each of these traits can be found in Hamlet, but the ambiguity surrounding his tragic flaw, or the defect in his character that leads to his downfall, remains the subject of critical debate. One argument is that the prince's fatal error that causes him to delay killing Claudius is his preoccupation with moral beauty and, with its loss in Denmark, his desire to die. Hamlet's obsession with death and suicide thus demonstrates that even before he encounters the Ghost, he has lost the will to involve himself in worldly affairs. This notion corresponds to another important reading of the prince as a victim of excessive melancholy, or an abnormal state of depression (Thomas Gale).

We see Hamlet in other persons even more clearly than in himself. His relation to each of them is immediate and delicate; his least gesture records itself in them- their concern, their pity, their love, their anger, or their fear. They cannot be indifferent to him, and this is one reason that we cannot. Nor his vanity in him causes. He has not willed nor desired his eminence. It is not his nature to dominate humanity, and at last, destroy it.
Life may have poured onto Hamlet the fullest gifts of music which clearly innervates through his whole being and undeniably reverberates around him. Hamlet was a musician. He was capable of producing his music. He has a skilled tongue and he was a wizard of words. His tongue is as flexible as his mind. It knows its way among words, all tones, all attitudes. And it is superbly trained. The intellect of its owner is apparent in nothing so much as his literary skill. With no notice at all, it may make him one of the most brilliant composers. Hamlet always shows his genuine emotions and was naturally histrionic which makes it easy for him to make such wonderful compositions as the likes of Beethoven and Mozart. Hamlet was generally melancholic. A character who shows being easily affected by the changes in his surroundings, be they positive or negative, Hamlet would always try to respond to them. Most composers and musicians were able to capture and understand true emotions when they were in their loneliest times. Being melancholic means also that he can be aware of his emotions all the time and eventually put them into words. This could create a real sentimental type of music since it comes from within. Music that comes from real emotions is music with attitude. Hamlet was endowed with this. He may just as well make use of it or if not, he would accidentally discover that he could be a good musician indeed. He has the capacity for strong feelings. When his ladylove Ophelia died, Hamlet may have been able to write some of the greatest compositions on love and pain. It was the best time when thoughts may have poured and the emotions just kept on stirring him. If he were to put them into words, the feelings he had, he would have come up with none other but the most honest and straight-from-the-heart composition. Hamlet shows enough willingness to learn and develop. If the music is innate in him, he would probably realize it and later on polish it. It is just as important for a musician to polish his forte to be one of the best, if not the best. He has skillful versatility, which is used in music, and would be a great help. Read More